to forget. After that she teaches them
to work and to love.

Jewish Men And Depression

In a chapter that examines depression and
world populations, he touches on the
subject of Jewish men and depression.
In general, women suffer from
depression at a greater rate than men.
However, studies have shown that
Jewish men have a much higher rate
of depression than non-Jewish men,
suffering from the disease at about the
same rate as Jewish women.
In conversation, he suggests numer-
ous hypotheses:
• Many depressed men in the gener-
al population are not diagnosed
because they deal with their feelings
through violence, and Jewish men as a
population are disinclined to violence.
• Jewish men are more willing to
admit to being depressed than non-
Jewish men and are more open to psy-
chology and psychoanalysis.
• Jewish men are more prone to intro-
spection, and introspective people tend
more toward depression.
• In the general population, studies
have shown that women have higher
rates of depression because of their
connections with their children. Yet,
among Jews, men as well as women
form empathetic relationships with
their children.
• Jewish men, Solomon says, tend to
have a profound sense of family con-
nections and "the extreme intimacy of
the Jewish family can mean an
extreme intimacy of loss."
"Judaism has a mournful and nostal-
gic strain in it," he says, noting the
sense of interrupted history in the dias-
pora and the legacy of the Holocaust.
"That, too, contributes to depression.
What's historical, what's cultural and
how it all fits together is hard to say."

Mother's Suicide

In detail, Solomon tells his own story
of breakdowns, treatments, lapses, and
thoughts of suicide.
A severe episode was triggered by
the death by suicide of his mother,
who was suffering from cancer. He
I describes the "walking death" quality
of his life. His abundant material
comforts couldn't shield him from
despair, the "sadness of dinosaur pro-
portions."
When asked if it was difficult to be
so open in print, the author replies, "I
had the experience of being closeted
about my sexuality at one point,
which was a horrible experience. I

don't ever want to be wandering
around with a big secret fromthe
world."
Solomon says his own openness has
inspired people to be more open with
him; he's had no experience of stigma-
tization although he knows it's out
there. He's almost embarrassed by the
many people who praise his coura-
geousness and honesty, "as if I were
some sort of war hero.
"I'm in rather good shape now," he
says. "The discussion appears to be
historical though in fact I think of
depression as chronic. The medication
is working now. I'm not depressed. I
could be again. I assume that I'll have
another [depressive episode] at some
stage, or more of them in the future."
Solomon is a member of the board of
directors of several arts-related organiza-
tions including the World Monuments
Fund, Alliance for the Arts and the
Shakespeare Project, an organization that
gets inner city kids involved in theater.
He's also trying to have some impact
on mental health policy, and feels strong-
ly about advocating on behalf of people
who experience poverty and depression.
"There's the Emma Lazarus thing com-
ing to the surface," he laughs.

Biblical Reference

A self-described reform Jew who iden-
tifies with cultural aspects of Judaism,
Solomon reads biblical texts with a
philosophical or literary bent.
"It all shapes the way I think a lot,"
he says. He particularly loves the books
of Job and Ecclesiastes, as they relate to
depression. Ecclesiastes, always his
favorite book in the Bible, is "really an
expression of emptiness and despair."
The title Noonday Demon is drawn
from the 91st Psalm, as translated in
the King James version of the Bible. In
the Jewish Publication Society transla-
tion, the line is rendered as "the
scourge that ravages at noon."
"There's the idea that other demons
wait until midnight," Solomon
explains. "This is the demon that
never leaves you alone.
In his final chapter on hope, he
explains that the opposite of depression
is not happiness but vitality. Although
he hates the momentary feelings of
hopelessness that he occasionally expe-
riences, he recognizes
that "they have
-
driven me to look deeper at life, to
find and cling to reasons for living."
Through his depression, Solomon
says, he unexpectedly discovered his
soul. In the book's closing lines, he
seems to echo the biblical injunction
in Deuteronomy to "choose life." E

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